Each of the chapters in Ultimania contains a section of interviews with the key devs and each interview includes a little aside titled “A Secret About FFXVI Only I Know.” Azeria () has shared a few of these on Xitter already and I’ve () filled in the rest and rounded them up into a single post. Some are more enlightening than others, but they’re all little windows into the incredible amount of work and attention to detail that went into the making of Final Fantasy XVI.
CHAPTER 1 Characters & World
Q&A with Key Devs ① (pg. 87)
高橋和哉 Kazuya Takahashi: Character & Visual Design
I wanted to make chocobos this time look like eagles that can fight, and drew them with the intention that they were carnivorous. I never told anyone else on staff though, so they eat gysahl greens as usual.
石井晴也 Ishii Haruya: Lead Character Artist
Charon’s right eye is established to be artificial, so to suit her highly particular personality, we gave her a special false eye made from a stone with a beautiful hue reminiscent of lapis lazuli.
園部淳 Sonobe Jun: Lead Character Artist
The models of Ifrit and Garuda we used for the early stage battle testing were of a quality that wasn’t so different from their final versions and were completed within a two week period. We were running a simple output of speed sculpt models, but this was made possible due to the cooperation of our graphics programmers, thanks to whom the production process was carried out smoothly.
山手清嗣 Yamate Seiji: Lead Environment Concept Artist
Of the many artworks [which appear in the game], one of the hardest to produce was [Mid’s] doodle (→P.708). When I was agonising over what to do, I recalled the portraits and shoebills my own daughter had drawn and used them as a reference on the down low. The fact that I also had my daughter help me make several of the designs on [Shirleigh’s] board is a secret I’m only sharing here.
栗原直樹 Kurihara Naoki: Environment CG Director
We were given fairly free rein with the design of the world map, and when making the symbol-icons for the cities on the map, I used the paperweights I’d made during my school years as a reference. I’m thinking Rosalith, the capital of the Grand Duchy of Rosaria, would be the easiest to use as a paperweight.
福澤礼 Fukuzawa Rei: Lead Environment Artist
The 3D models for FFXVI are all made to scale relative to one another, without fudging anything. The largest object in the game is the crystal of darkness Ultima calls forth, which was made with a height of 60 km. Origin, within it, has a diameter of more than 6 km and is in fact larger than the field maps of the various nations.
CHAPTER 2 Battle System
Q&A with Key Devs ② (pg. 196)
山本泰弘 Yamamoto Yasuhiro: Lead Game System Programer
The function allowing you to ride a chocobo was added in midway through development. It was difficult to program the modifications that made riding them possible, but thanks to that I think we were able to create a sense of speed as you move about the field. And Torgal also runs his heart out keeping up. Come to think of it, if you ever called Torgal a ‘dog’ in the dev chat, Maehiro (Creative Director Maehiro Kazutoyo) would reply with an anger mark (💢).
本田圭 Honda Kei: Lead Graphic Programmer
The size of Clive’s graphics data is roughly 24 times that of the Warrior of Light (the player character) from FFXIV. The genres of the two games are completely different so you can’t simply compare them, but the generational evolution is remarkable.
小山田衛 Oyamada Mamoru: Lead Client/UI Programmer
The data load time of FFXVI is very brief, so there are no loading screens like you often see in other games, but before the data loading was sped up, dedicated images were displayed during loading that corresponded to the [player’s] game progress.
橋本祐介 Hashimoto Yusuke: Lead Development Environment Programmer
In the main cutscenes, we used the facial MoCap (motion capture) from the overseas actors and the lip sync is matched to the English, but in a fraction of the scenes we’re generating the lip sync from the vocals and, based on the audio language you’ve selected, the movement of the [characters’] mouths changes accordingly.
CHAPTER 3 Scenario
Q&A with Key Devs ③ (pg. 326)
廣田俊明 Hirota Toshiaki: Lead Cinematic Artist
In the scene where a young Clive and Jill talk on the balcony at night, the direction that Jill leaves in when the conversation ends ended up being in the opposite direction to where her room is established to be. When I noticed it, the scene had already been completed and I thought, ‘Now I’ve done it!’, but the players have no way of knowing where her room is so we left it that way (lol).
幡谷徹 Hataya Toru: Lead Cinematic Artist
The directors who are heavy smokers and Yoshida (Producer Yoshida Naoki) gave us a slew of specific instructions about Cid’s cigarettes (lol). At first, it was just that the end would glow and give off smoke, but the depiction evolved to the point that when Cid took a drag on it, it would glow red hot and shorten.
岩渕栄太郎 Iwabuchi Eitaro: Lead Cinematic Technical Artist
There were those who were referring to young Jill as ‘ko-jiru’ (child + Jill), and when I first heard it in a meeting, I misunderstood that it was some sort of soup dish* and was like, ‘What are we talking about now?’ I soon put it together, but personally I found it mad funny.
*n.b. ‘shiru’ (汁) means ‘broth’ and would become ‘jiru’ due to sound modification when tacked onto ‘ko’ like this.
沢田裕貴 Sawada Hirotaka: Lead Cut Scene Motion Artist
This is an anecdote about one of the actors who did the facial capture, but when we reconvened after a recording hiatus, he’d grown a magnificent beard he hadn’t had at the previous session. Thinking about the data processing post-filming, I broke out in a cold sweat.
CHAPTER 4 Sub-Events
Q&A with Key Devs ④ (pg. 435)
松浪保之 Matsunami Yukiya: Lead Level Designer
There are many battlefield scenes in this title, and each and every fallen soldier in them has their own story. The developers in charge of the scenes placed them whilst imagining ‘He received this type of wound and expired here,’ and so on. Having previously worked on Biohazard, the ways in which the characters that appear died is an aspect of telling the story that I care about.
千葉知樹 Chiba Tomoki: Lead Lighting Artist
In the back of Cid’s solar is the room Mid had been using, and a doodle Mid had drawn remains on the wall beside the bed（→ P. 708). As things were, it was dark and hard to see the doodle, so we placed candles there to illuminate it.
三谷豪右 Mitani Goyu: Animator
The motion capture for young Jill carrying Torgal in her arms was filmed using a chocobo plushie we had at the studio standing in for Torgal. We also made models of the cannon barrels carried by the Imperial Cannoniers for filming purposes, but they were large and took up space, so they have now been dismantled.
上田克 Ueda Suguru: Animator
In the Garuda fight, there was a part after the biggest explosion in which Ifrit deals a killing blow to an extensively wounded Garuda. As a result of having made [the scene] from the standpoint of ‘let’s push the envelope on this depiction,’ the finished content was fairly ghastly and became an outtake.
佐藤修一 Satou Shuuichi: VFX Director
Fairly early on in production, a bug developed where Torgal’s fur would grow long radially and he turned into this cute, fluffy ball.
大野茂幸 Ohno Shigeyuki: Lead Cinematic VFX Artist
Once, a dog I owned stepped on a lit cigarette someone had chucked onto the ground and let out a pained cry, so in scenes where Torgal walks on ground that’s been scorched by magic I made sure that he never steps on anything flaming.
CHAPTER 5 Items
Q&A with Key Devs ⑤ (pg. 489)
髙久純史 Takaku Atsushi: Lead UI Artist & Designer
When you display the Abilities by pressing the [ R2 ] button and such, the design for Ultima’s World Order shows up for just an instant. This was meant as a hint expressing that ‘even as Clive fights against the laws of the world, in the end, he is doing so using the power of the Eikons Ultima created, and everything is in the palm of Ultima’s hand.’
青柳芳典 Aoyagi Yoshinori: Lead UI/Sound System Designer
During development, in order to check the sound effects on the footsteps, at one point we changed Clive’s footsteps to a beeping sound like on an 8 bit gaming console. It gave off a fun vibe that didn’t match the serious content of the game, which made it highly amusing.
Michael-Christopher Koji Fox: Localization Director
The “Tub and Crown” at the hideaway is actually named after the Forbidden Land, Eureka from FFIII. According to legend, when the scholar Archimedes got into a bathtub (tub), he realized that the volume of the water displaced was equal to the volume of his body, and allegedly shouted ‘Eureka! (I’ve found it!).’ This principle was later used to measure the purity of gold crowns (crown), hence from the name ‘Eureka’ I got ‘tub’ and ‘crown.’
池上周 Ikegami Shu: Previz Director (Image/Studio Division)
The person who arranged for the motion capture recording using British actors this time around, from the audition stage onwards, was Neil Newbon, who was in charge of the motions for Noctis, the main character in Kingsglaive: FFXV. He also portrays Dion[’s MoCap] in FFXVI.
佐藤英 Satoh Ei: Movie Director (Image/Studio Division)
In the scene where Clive and Joshua ride on Bahamut and make for Origin, if you calculate the altitude correctly, they’d be flying in the stratosphere. Due to programming specifications, it wasn’t possible to display clouds at that height, so we used pre-rendering technology to create the sea of clouds.
CHAPTER 6 Enemies
Q&A with Key Devs ⑥ (pg. 586)
祖堅正義 Soken Masayoshi: Musical Director & Main Composer
This is about the moogle at the hideaway, Nektar-sama (lol), but in the early stages of development the little beep-boop sounds of him floating and his listless voice saying ‘kupo...’ could be heard over a fairly broad area. Even as you were having a serious conversation with Otto, he was crying nearby, so even though the world was heading towards its end, the atmosphere was quite merry.
今村貴文 Imamura Takafumi: Composer
The BGM for the island of Mist that you can visit near the game’s end was originally made for use in the cutscene when young Clive and Jill talk on the veranda. That was changed, and at one point it played in Clive’s chambers, but it was changed again and we settled for using it on the island of Mist; it’s a song that went through quite a few twists and turns.
石川大樹 Ishikawa Daiki: Composer
In the scene where the Rosarian army holds a feast at Phoenix Gate, the drunk soldiers sing a Rosarian military song (the Rosarian anthem), but the Japanese version of this song was sung by volunteers from the sound department. In a work-from-home environment, each member sang a ‘serious version’ and a ‘drunk version’ etc., which were then layered together to make it sound like they’re singing in chorus.
CHAPTER 7 Maps
Q&A with Key Devs ⑦ (pg. 695)
中嶋洋介 Nakashima Yousuke: Sound Director
Personally, I’m fond of the movement noises of the moogle at the hideaway (Nektar) since they turned out cute, and—partly to make the location of the Hunt Board apparent—we had set the range where the sounds could be heard to cover a relatively broad area. The thing is, several events in the main story occur right near the moogle so we received requests from various quarters saying, ‘hearing comedic sounds during serious scenes can detract from them, so please make them inaudible’....... After making various adjustments, ultimately the sounds aren’t audible until you get fairly close to the moogle.
田中耕太 Tanaka Kota: Marketing Manager
In the trailers and commercials that we released leading up to the release, we included a little something that will make you think, ‘Oh, this is...!’ if you view them once you’ve played the game, so I hope you’ll look for it.
河本信昭 Komoto Nobuaki: Lead Project Manager
In order to make them convincing, numerous detailed instructions were given regarding the fields. In particular, Yoshida (Director Naoki Yoshida)’s instructions regarding the vineyard and wine cellar were very detailed (lol).
谷山葉子 Taniyama Yoko: Lead Project Manager
The prototype of Benedikta was incredibly strong. She came at you with such force no one could beat her.
髙井浩 Takai Hiroshi: Main Director
To tell the truth, I had wanted to implement a ‘custom sound function’ that would allow you to play your favourite BGM during the Eikon and boss battles. We seriously looked into implementing it, but the BGM system for the Eikon battles was too complicated. I realized that replacing it with another song was just a pipe dream, so I gave up....... However, during the actual Eikon battles the BGM transitions naturally and dramatically to suit the situation, so I was very satisfied with the end result.
CHAPTER 8 Secrets
Q&A with Key Devs ⑧ (pg. 730)
Visual Section
皆川裕史 Minagawa Hiroshi: Art Director
In the final stages of development, I noticed a difference in lighting quality between the main story cutscenes and the sidequests, but the lighting department already had their hands full with the cutscenes so I took on the job without much thought, only to learn that there were around 800 scenes in the sidequests, so I spent about a month holed up in a dark, windowless conference room just doing lighting.
鈴木健夫 Suzuki Takeo: Cinematic Manager
Producing each individual cutscene was difficult, as well, but we struggled with coordinating stringing them all together, too. In sequences with a series of cutscenes, if the data for the next scene couldn’t be loaded in time, a few seconds of the adventure could be made into a movie to buy time for loading and, conversely, in cases where the loading was too fast and it was difficult to notice the scene change, we intentionally extend the blackouts.
野末武志 Nozue Takeshi: General Manager (Image/Studio Division)
The characters’ lip sync uses English as the base, but even though it’s all English, each English speaking country—such as America or England—has its own accents. This time, the characters’ accents were set based on their place of origin and upbringing, so we gathered actors from a range of countries and did the facial capture to ensure the mouth movements matched the accents.
Battle Section
鈴木良太 Suzuki Ryota: Combat Director
There are four abilities for each Eikon, but initially there were plans for six. We also had the idea of having more levels of ability upgrades than there are now, with the combat tactics changing with each level. We had to give up due to development time constraints, but personally I’m a little regretful we weren’t able to make it a reality.
須藤賢次 Sudo Kenji: Lead Combat Designer
In the part of the Ultimalius battle where Clive and Ultima go at each other with the Eikons’ powers, there was also an idea to have each of them summon all of their Eikons and have a 7-on-7 Eikon battle. Amongst the dev team this was being called, ‘Eikons, Knights of the Round,’ but it was quickly scrapped.......
鯨岡健生 Kujiraoka Takeo: Lead Combat Designer (& DLC Director)
You won’t notice it when playing the game normally, but the Eikon Ifrit as a playable character has six sets of data, including that of Ifrit Risen. Since each one is equipped with motions and effects exclusive to a specific battle, even though their appearances are similar, internally a different Ifrit is used for each battle.
滝澤智宏 Takizawa Tomohiro: Lead Combat Director
At the beginning of development, we were thinking of a system where, in order to portray the personalities of each companion, party members would go their own way when visiting a town, spending the time however they wanted at their favorite shops, friends’ houses, etc. The proposition was rejected because the conversations during the quests wouldn’t be consistent if your companions were in different locations, which was a bit disappointing.
Scenario Section
前廣和豊 Maehiro Kazutoyo: Creative Director & Original Screenplay Writer
Due to her eruditeness, Vivian Ninetales was often targeted before she took refuge in Clive’s hideaway. She has changed her name several times to hide her true identity, and since she is currently using her ninth alias she’s ‘Ninetales.’ Before that she probably went by ‘Eight-something-or-other’ (lol).
横山文子 Yokoyama Ayako: Lead Game Designer
Directly following the Eikon battle with Garuda, Clive is strung up naked in a cell in Cid’s hideaway. Due to cost considerations it was unfortunately cut, but that was because there was danger that Clive would self-harm or rampage, and so the scenario is that it was Tarja, a doctor, rather than Cid, who stripped him naked and threw him in the cell for safety.
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